Nation news briefs

TEXAS WOMAN GETS $1.4M UTILITY BILL IN ERROR : ABILENE, Texas (AP) — A lot of people gripe when they get high summertime electric bills. But Kristin Harriger's bill was nearly $1.4 million.

The Abilene, Texas, woman immediately called her provider, Potentia Energy. She quickly learned that her bill was an error.

The utility provider also excused a $66,000 late fee listed on the bill.

The bill said Harriger was being charged 100,000 cents, or $1,000, per kilowatt hour. The normal rate ranges from 8.2 cents to 12.1 cents.

COURT: CAN EPA REGULATE MUD FROM LOGGING ROADS? GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — The timber industry is hoping that the U.S. Supreme Court will maintain business as usual on controlling muddy water running off logging roads into salmon streams.

The high court decided Monday to take up a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that federal regulators should treat stormwater on industrial timberlands the same as pollution discharged from a factory, changing the longstanding practice that treats it like water coming off farm fields.

The ruling on an Oregon case would apply to logging roads on state, private and national forest lands throughout the jurisdiction of the 9th Circuit, which covers much of the West. Most of the roads are graveled, but some are paved or bare dirt.

Tom Partin, president of the American Forest Resource Council, said increased regulation would cost money and offer conservation groups new opportunities for blocking logging without producing any cleaner water.

WASH. PATROL: MAN THROWS WIFE FROM CAR ON HIGHWAY: ELLENSBURG, Wash. (AP) — The Washington State Patrol says a man shoved his wife from a moving car on a highway, and later fought with a state trooper who stopped him down the road.

The car was on the shoulder, traveling about 15 mph, on Interstate 90 about 70 miles east of Seattle. The woman suffered minor injuries in the Sunday incident.

A trooper who stopped the suspect down the road put him in the patrol car. The man broke through a window and fought with the trooper who eventually subdued him. The man was treated at a hospital for facial cuts and booked into the Kittitas County Jail in Ellensburg for investigation of assault.

PLANE TOWS SWASTIKA BANNER, STARTLES NJ BEACHGOERS: LONG BEACH, N.J. (AP) — A group that claimed responsibility for flying a small plane towing a swastika banner over New Jersey's shore and New York City over the weekend said the display was not meant as an endorsement of anti-Semitism, but as an attempt to resurrect the symbol's more benign roots.

The sight startled beachgoers on Saturday afternoon and set Twitter abuzz. A group called the International Raelian Movement, which believes humans were created by extraterrestrials, says it was responsible.

The movement said on its website that the flyover was part of its third annual Swastika Rehabilitation Day. In a statement posted Sunday, the group reiterated its belief that the swastika is actually a symbol of peace and beauty that was corrupted by Nazis in 20th century Germany.

"Any negative emotions regarding the swastika by people under the age of 70 years old are obviously linked to their education and not to their experiences," the statement read in part. "It's about time people were re-educated to understand the original meaning of the oldest and most recurrent symbol in the world."

Etzion Neuer, acting head of the Anti-Defamation League in New Jersey, also noted that the swastika predates Hitler by hundreds, if not thousands, of years. He said that the group is not racist and that towing the swastika was a "misguided, but not malicious, act."